The present invention relates, in general, to electronics and, more particularly, to semiconductor components and methods of forming semiconductor components.
In the past, the semiconductor industry used various methods and structures to form electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection devices. According to one international specification, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) specification commonly referred to as IEC 61000-4-2 (level 2), it is desirable for an ESD device to respond to a high input voltage and current within approximately 1 nanosecond (the IEC has an address at 3, rue de Varembe, 1211 Geneve 20, Switzerland).
Some of the prior ESD devices used a Zener diode and a P-N junction diode to attempt to provide ESD protection. In general, the prior ESD devices had to trade off low capacitance against having a sharp breakdown voltage characteristic. The sharp breakdown voltage characteristic was needed to provide a low clamp voltage for the ESD device. In most cases, the device structures had a high capacitance, generally greater than about one to six (1-6) picoFarads. The high capacitance limited the response time of the ESD device. Some prior ESD devices operated in a punch-through mode which required the devices to have a very thin and accurately controlled epitaxial layer, generally less than about 2 microns thick, and required a low doping in the epitaxial layer. These structures generally made it difficult to accurately control the clamping voltage of the ESD device and especially difficult to control low clamping voltages, such as voltages of less than about ten volts (10 V). One example of such an ESD device was disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,880,511 which issued on Mar. 9, 1999 to Bin Yu et al. Another ESD device used a body region of a vertical MOS transistor to form a Zener diode at an interface with an underlying epitaxial layer. The doping profiles and depths used for the ESD device resulted in a high capacitance and a slow response time. Additionally, it was difficult to control the light doping levels in the thin layers which made it difficult to control the breakdown voltage of the ESD device. An example of such an ESD device was disclosed in United States patent publication No. 2007/0073807 of inventor Madhur Bobde which was published on Mar. 29, 2007.
Accordingly, it would be advantageous to have an ESD protection device that has a low capacitance, that has a fast response time, that reacts to both a positive and a negative ESD event, that has a well controlled clamp voltage, that is easy to control in manufacturing, and that has a clamp voltage that can be controlled over a range of voltages from a low voltage to a high voltage. It would be of further advantage for the method and circuit to be cost efficient to implement.
For simplicity and clarity of the illustration, elements in the figures are not necessarily to scale, and the same reference characters in different figures denote the same elements. Additionally, descriptions and details of well-known steps and elements are omitted for simplicity of the description. As used herein current carrying electrode means an element of a device that carries current through the device such as a source or a drain of an MOS transistor or an emitter or a collector of a bipolar transistor or a cathode or an anode of a diode, and a control electrode means an element of the device that controls current flow through the device such as a gate of an MOS transistor or a base of a bipolar transistor. Although the devices are explained herein as certain N-channel or P-Channel devices, or certain N-type of P-type doped regions, a person of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that complementary devices are also possible in accordance with embodiments of the present invention. It will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the words during, while, and when as used herein are not exact terms that mean an action takes place instantly upon an initiating action but that there may be some small but reasonable delay, such as a propagation delay, between the reaction that is initiated by the initial action. The use of the word approximately or substantially means that a value of element has a parameter that is expected to be very close to a stated value or position. However, as is well known in the art there are always minor variances that prevent the values or positions from being exactly as stated. It is well established in the art that variances of up to about ten percent (10%) (and up to twenty percent (20%) for semiconductor doping concentrations) are regarded as reasonable variances from the ideal goal of exactly as described. For clarity of the drawings, doped regions of device structures are illustrated as having generally straight line edges and precise angular corners. However, those skilled in the art understand that due to the diffusion and activation of dopants the edges of doped regions generally may not be straight lines and the corners may not be precise angles.